Chapter 27 R I I & R Li Romanticism & Realism Europe and America, 1800
Chapter 27 RiiRomanticism & RliRealism Europe and America, 1800 to 1870 Industrial Revolution caused a population boom in cities Railroads spread across the continent. While the century opened with Neoclassicism, by 1870 Romanticism and Realism prevailed. New construction techniques impacted architecture. Invention of photography revolutionized picture making. Napoleon was most powerful man in Europe, after serving as a French army commander leading major campaigns in Italy and Egypt, in 1799 became 1st Consul of the FhFrench RRbliepublic (title with clear and intentional links to ancient Roman Republic). Emperor of France (pope witnessed coronation) and king of Italy in 1804 Disastrous invasion of Russia (()ended in defeat) & in 1815 devastatin g defeat by British in Waterloo (present-day Belgium) Forced to abdicate throne in 1815, into exile on Saint Helena, S. Atlantic. •Pupil of David, Napoleon’s favorite painter. •Paintings contributed to Napoleon’s growing mythic status. •At Napoleon’s request, painted him visiting mosque at Jaffa in 1799, which was converted to a hospital during outbreak of bubonic plague – striking French and Muslim forces, to suppress the growing panic.
Officers covering noses because of stench; Napoleon is fearless and in control. Removed glove to touch sores of victim – miraculous power to heal, as doubting Thomas touching Christ’s wound. Napoleon as Christ like figure – Rembrandt’s Hundred-Guilder Print. On left Muslim doctors distributing bread and ministering to sick Composition similar to David’s Oath of the Horatii – polarized scheme with arcaded backdrop SdfilfSeated figure on left – Mich el angel o’ s LJdLast Judgment Kneeling nude with extended arm on right – Michelangelo’s late Pieta Emphasis on death, suffering, emotional rendering, exoticism of Muslim world – presaged core elements of Romanticism. Cue Card •After fall of French Cue Card revolutionary, David barely escaped with his life , stood trial and went to prison. After his release in 1795, he worked to resurrect his career. •Napoleon approached him in 1804, offering him – First Painter of the Empire position. •Earlier, David had painted Napoleon crossing the Alps on horseback. •Coronation was David’s most grandiose work – mostly historical fact.
Napoleon favored Neoclassism – aspired to rule an empire that might rival ancient Rome’s. Embraced classical past as symbolic sources of authority and aware of power of art for constructing a public image. Interior of Paris’ Notre Dame Cathedral decorated by emperor’s architects, Napoleon is crowning wife (underscores his authority after he crowned himself), Pope Pius VII seated behind Napoleon (emperor insisted that his hand be raised in blessing), Napoleon’s mother (who was not there) appears in the blbalcony, as we ll as D avid . Structured composition similar to Oath of Horatii – as a theater, Catholic Church clergy on right, imperial court on left. Relationship between church and state was one of this period’s most contentious issues. Napoleon’s favorite Cue Card sculptor, who somewhat reluctantly left career in Italy to serve in Paris. Napoleon’s sister demanded to be portrayed as Venus (reflected her self-perception) Holding golden apple – triumph in judgment of Paris (when she promised him Helen, the start of the Trojan War).
Seminude as Hellenistic Venus de Milo; reclining figure from Roman sarcophagus lids. Napoleon arranged marriage of sister to heir of noble Roman family. Her behavior was less than dignified, public gossiped about her affairs. Her hus ban d, PPirince Cam illo Borgh ese kept the scul ltpture in his Villa in Rome, where it still is. Relatively few people to saw it, which increased the notoriety of both artist and subject. Cue Card Apotheosis of Homer, Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres 1827, Oil on canvas, 12’8 X 16’10
Compare to Raphael, School of Athens Inspired by The School of a Athens by Raphael who was his favorite artists The painting presented a single statement about the ideal form Neoclassical celebration or Homer and other ancient individuals such as Dante, Present at the Salon of 1827 Homer sits like a god on a throne before an Ionic temple, Winged Victory crowns the epic poet Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres, Apotheosis of Homer, 1827.
Michelangelo
Nike Plato Aristotle
Raphael Socrates
Homer
Alex. The Great Aesop Aristotle Mozart
“Iliad” “Odyssey”
Poussi n Shakespeare Reclining nude – classical antiquity and Renaissance Head similar to Raphael’s Relaxed pose, small head, elongated limbs, cool color scheme – PiiiParmigianino & Italian Mannerists Romantic, exotic theme – Odalisque (woman in Turkish harem) Classical form with Romantic themes brought confusion and harsh criticism when first exhibited in 1814 – Ingres as rebel in both form and content Attacks cease in mid-1820s when Delacroix, a greater enemy of David’s Neoclassical style appeared on the scene. Then Ingres’ work was seen as still containing crucial element of Neoclassicism and he became the leader of academic forces in the battle against “barbarism” of the Romantic movement. Cue Card Past – longing for pre-industrial Europe (Gothic architecture will be revived) and the medieval past (imagined to include ghoulish, infernal, nightmarish, grotesque, sadistic – the chamber of horrors when reason sleeps). Irrational/ Inner mind / Insanity – Romantic artists depict human psyche and topics that transcend reason. Gericault chose to do portraits of people in an insane asylum. Nature – longing for the purity of nature, which defies human rationality Emotion/ Exotic – Romantics favored emotion and passion over reason/ thinking. Exotic themes and locales were also popular because they did not adhere to European emphasis on rationality. Rousseau – “Man is born free, but is everywhere in chains.” (Social Contract 1762) Romanticism emerged from a desire for freedom: political, thought, feeling, action worship, speech, and taste. Believed freedom was a right and property of all. Burke (1729 – 1797) wrote about the sublime – awe mixed with terror; fear could be thrilli ng, i.e. rag ing r ivers or st orms at sea. Born in Switzerland, settled in England, Royal Academy member and instructor, but llargelyargely seselflf-taught.taught. Known for demonic, macabre, and sadistic horrific night fantasies. EtiErotic theme; horse as a mal e symbol coming through parted red theatrical curtains; woman lying on bed in a tortured sexual sleep Mara or mare is an evil spirit or goblin in Scandinavian folklore which rides on people's chests, tormenting and suffocating them while they sleep, bringing on bad dreams (or "nightmares"). Not an illustration of a nightmare, but the sensation of Cue Card terror it produces. The mare is similar to the mythical creature incubus, a demon believed in medieval times to prey, often sexually on sleeping women, and was likely inspired by sleep paralysis Romantic artists combined Baroque dynamism with naturalistic details Inspiration from dreams – rationalist search for material explanations stifled spirituality. He wrote and illustrated his own work, this is from a book of his poems The figure is UiUrizen, a pun on “your reason” -an evil Enlightenment figure of rational thinking. embodiment of conventional reason and law, depp;icted as a bearded old man; he sometimes bears architect's tools, to create/constrain the universe; or nets, with which he ensnares people in webs of law and conventional society. In early works, Urizen represents the chains of reason that are imposed on the mind; like mankind, he is bound by these. Figures covers the sun with is body, opens his fingers in an impossible way to measure the earth with calipers.
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David’s contemporary; Goya thought about Enlightenment and Neoclassical insistence on rationa lity and order. Depicted himself asleep, with oos(sybosooy)adbatswls (symbols of folly) and bats (symbols of ignorance). How to read the etching? What emerges when reason is suppressed . . . or Goya’s commitment to creative process and Romantic spirit – the unleashing of imagination, emotions and nightmares? According to Greek/Roman myth FRANCISCO –a son of Kronos (Roman Saturn) GOYA, Saturn would overthrow him, just as he Devouring One of His had overthrown his father. To Children, 1819–1823. prevent this, Saturn ate his children moments after each was born. Saturn is associated with time – (()Greek for time). Goya – deaf after contracting a fever in 1792 Goya’s understanding of hitWitdNl’humanity. Witnessed Napoleon’s restoration of the monarchy destroying country. Despair over passage of time? Cyclical nature oftif time? In 1786 official artist of Charles IV, family portrait in 1800 (after Velasquez) was unflattering, not idealized, with spectacular costumes. Reflects enlightenment thinking – critique of monarchy. Dissatisfaction with Charles IV’s rule increased, Spanish people began supporting his son, Ferdinand VII, who enlisted aid of Napoleon to overthrow his father and mother. Napoleon sent troops to Spain, ousted Charles IV, and installed his brother, Joseph Bonaparte (r. 1808 – 1813) on the throne. On May 2, 1808, Cue Card Spanish people finally recognized French as invaders and violently attacked Napoleon’s soldiers. In retaliation, the French executed Spanish citizens the next day. Third of May, 1808, was commissioned in 1814 by Ferdinand VII who reclaimed throne after ouster of the French. Robotic repetitive movements of the faceless French Central Spanish figure is in Christ-like sacrificial pose with hand marks of the nailed crucifixion Brutal inhumanity displayed in blood-soaked foreground Cue Card •Studied with an admirer of David, Pierre-Narcisse Guerin – rigorous training in classical drawing, didn’t like rigidity or idealism of Neoclassical style. •AtA contemporary even t – NOT a history painting! •1816 shipwreck off coast of Africa of French frigate Medusa, incompetence of captain (a political appointee) caused ship to run aground on a reef. •150 passengers built a raft from ship, drifted for 12 days, 15 survived.
•8thtlt8 months to complete – viitdhisited hosp itlitals and morgues t o exami ne corpses, i nt ervi ewed survivors, built a model of the raft in studio. •Composition in an X shape, pile of bodies similar to Gros’ Napoleon at the Plague House . . . Raft on a diagggponal/ foreshortening into viewers’ space. •Lighting like Caravaggio, figures like Michelangelo •Commentary on the practice of slavery, member of abolitionist group, placed Jean Charles – black soldier on top. Parisian uprising against Charles X at end of July 1830. Allegorical personification of Liberty wearing Phrygian cap (symbol of freed slave in antiquity. Strong pyramid stttructure Parisian types – street boy with pistols (symbolizes the role of students in the revolt) , middle class by man in top hat and carrying rifle; lower class represented by man at extreme left with sword in hand and pistol on belt. Towers of Notre-Dame – specificity of locale and event balances contemppyorary historical fact with poetic allegory. Acquired by the French state in 1831, but not exhibited publically for 25 years because of subversive Cue Card message Cue Card Abbey in the Oak Forest, Caspar David Friedrich, 1810, Oil on canvas
“Why, it has often occurred to me to ask myself, do I so frequently choose death, transience, and the grave as subjects for my paintings. One must submit oneself many times to death in order some day to attain life everlasting.”
A Walk at Dusk A master of Romantic transcendental landscape, his landscapes were temples and his paintings were altarpieces This winter scene with a ruined Gothic church and cemetery demands the silence appropriate to sacred places A funeral procession bears a coffin into the ruins of a Gothic church,,y death are everywhere-season’s desolation His work balances an inner and outer experience – deep emotion pervades his paintings Snow •Landscape became an independent and respected genre (in this case – style/category of art, not realistic pgpainting of ever yy)yday scenes) in German y,g,y, England, and the United States. •Increased tourism – expanding railways contributed to popularity. •Painted nature as allegory –the “living garment of God,” (Goethe). •Romantic theme of soul unified with natural world – interpreted the signs and symbols of universal sppgirit’s transcendent meanings. •Oneness with nature; man is an active participant but does not disturb, cottage is one with the countryside, grows in among the trees •Everything and everyone in harmony with nature, an ideal state.
•IEIn Eng land dJhC, John Consta ble pa inte d nosta lilgic memories of disappearing rural pastoralism – due to the Industrial Revolution, prices for agrarian products were lowered and farmers no longer could aff or d to farm sma ll pl ots of l and . •However, Constable’s father was a wealthy rural landowner and many of his paintings were of his family’s property. •The HiHaywain (large f arm cart) i s si gnifi cant f or what it does not show – civil unrest of agrarian working class with outbreaks of violence and arson. •Met eorol ogi st b y avocati on, t ext ure th at cli mat e and weather – a delicate veil over landscape. Tiny dabs of color, stippled with white creates shimmer Cue Card of light suggesting movement and process. JOSEPH MALLORD WILLIAM TURNER, The Slave Ship (Slavers Throwing Overboard the Dead and Dying, Cue Card Typhoon Coming On) , 1840. Oil on canvas, 3’ x 4’.
•Burke’s concept of the sublime – awe mixed with terror •Responded to encroaching industrialism, The Slave Ship from 1783 incident in widely read book by Clarkson, reprinted in 1839. •When captain of ship realized insurance company would reimburse him for only for slaves lost at sea, not for those who died in route; ordered the sick and dying slaves thrown overboard. Relat ive sca l e of h um an f orm s com pared with vast sea and sky – immense power of nature over humans.
•On close inspection – iron shackles and manacles around wrists and ankles of drowning slaves. •Haziness of forms, indistinctness of compositions intensify the colors and energetic brushstrokes – expresses forces of nature and painter’s emotional response to them. •Turner’s emotive power of pure color and the subject of the work almost becoming paint itself were imppportant steps toward 20th centur y abstract art , which dis pensed with sha pe and form alto gether. Founder of the Hudson River School leader Painted undeveloped river Cue Card valley and scenes from across country. It was a reply to a British book that allege Americans had destroyed a wilderness with industry Identified qualities that made America unique, moral question of where our civilization was going. Oxbow shaped turning of Connecticut river, actual view of Massachusetts Storm on wilderness side, more developed civilization on right. Tiny artist bottom center wearing top hat, looks to viewer for country’s future course Cole’s division of landscape into two clearly contrasting areas; the Romantic on the left and the Claude-like landscape on the right . Advances in industrial technology reinforced Enlig htenment faith in connection between science and progress – Both intellectuals and the general public increasingly embraced empiricism and positivism. Empiricist, the basic of knowledge is observati on an d direct experi ence. Positi vi st s beli eved sci entifi c laws govern environment and human activity revealed through careful recording and analysis of observable data. Science as mind’s highest achievement. Realism developed mid-century and believed only contemporary world – what people can see, was “real.” Disapproved of historical and fictional subjects since they were not visible nor present, thfherefore not real . Courbet, leading figure in movement, used the term Realism. Subjects traditionally deemed unworthy of depiction – the mundane, working class laborer, peasants . . . sought to establish equality between contemporary subject matter and traditional themes of “high art.” Gustave Courbet, The Desperate Man, self portrait, 1843, oil on canvas, A young and an old man (suggesting those born in poverty remain there) breaking stones – lowest members of French society. Direct and accurate, not romanticized or idealized. In 1948 laborers rebelled against bourgeois leaders of new Second Republic and rest of nation demanding better working condition and Cue Card redistribution of property. Using a palette of dirty browns and grays, he conveyed the dreary and dismal nature of menial labor. Army suppressed uprising in 3 days, but trauma was long lasting and many lives were lost. The 1848 revolution raised issue of labor as national concern, Courbet was a pacifist and did not fight. 1871 joined Paris Commune a short-lived socialist revolutionary government. After demise of the Commune, Courbet arrested, sentenced to 6 months prison for involvement in destruction of the Vendôme Column, a symbol of Napoleonic Cue Card authority. Funeral of Courbet’s grand-uncle with actual townspeople – friends and family members not actor/ models. Ordinariness and starkly antiheroic composition horrified critics. Presented viewer with mundane realities of daily life and death. Used a palette knife to quickly place and unify paint – rough surface. In 1855 Salon rejected 2 of Courbet’s paintings – too coarse and “socialistic.” Withdrew all his works and set up own exhibit, the Pavilion of Realism – 1st artist to ever stage a private exhibit of his own work. “I have never seen and angel, Show me an angel and I will paint one.” Lived in Barbizon with other artists, 30 miles southeast of Paris, painted en pleine air, in the open air. Born of peasant stock , identifi ed with hard lot of rural poor. Sentimentality absent from Corbet’s work, but was attacked at Salon exhibit by critics that accused Millet of being a Socialist after 1848 revolution. Karl Marx’s Communist Manifesto was also published in 1848. Socialism growing movement, bourgeoisie was threatened by views on property, call for social justice, economic equality. Peasants depicted as noble – painting dignified their work. Middle class linked poor with dangerous, newly defined working class.
Lowest level of peasants – collected wheat scraps in field after harvest. After 1848 revolution, middle-class landowners resisted gggggranting gleaning rights, depiction of gleaning antagonized them. Cue Card Uprising of silk workers in Lyon, couldn’t live on wages. 4 days of fighting led to Paris uprising, single shot from workers’ housing killed a civil guard. Remaininggg guards stormed building and killed all the inhabitants. TiblTerrible, quitiet aftermath – baby under man.
Daumier – defender of urban working classes, contronted authority with social criticism and political protest. For biting depictions of Emperor Louis-Philippe in La Caricature in 1832, Daumier spent 6 months in prison where he began painting. Lithograph, Greek stone writing (1798), draw with grease pencil, water on stone, oil-based ink adheres to drawing but repelled by water. Cue Card
Poor huddled in the third- class compartment of a railroad car; lower-class section isolated from middle-class passengers emotional and physically Anonymous people going about their way
3rd class hard benches across the carriage. Anonymous, insignificant, dumbly patient with a lot they could not change. Ordinary appearance – vague, impersonal, blank faces. Figures in front represent a modern take on the Holy Family theme; Grandmother sits serenely, mother breastfeeds, g randchild sleep s Cue Card
Most celebrated woman artist of 19th century, training from father Believed as a woman artist – role to create new and perfect society. Depicted annual Parisian horse sale. Painted animals of French countryside. Parisian horse fair and the slaughterhouses to study anatomy. Panoramic composition similb’lar to Courbet’s Burial at Ornans. Inspired, Parthenon frieze, Greece, ca 447 – 438 BCE Loose brushwork like Gericault One of the most popular artworks of century, viewers eagerly bought engraved reproductions. ÉDOUARD MANET, Olympia, 1863. Oil on canvas, 4’ 3” x 6’ 2”. Cue Card
Inclusion of a black maid an a prostitute evoked moral depravity, inferiority, and animalistic sexuality . Also conjured racial divisions.
Titian Venus of Urbino
•How has Manet appropriated Titian’s painting to comment on social issues and to challenge artistic traditions? •Olympia, common professional name for prostitutes Direct Painting – Alla Prima Glazing (Ita lian, a t firs t a ttemp t) Brushstrokes are much rougher and shifts in tonality more abrupt than in Renaissance and traditional academic painting of the time. Cue Card Based on real people – favorite model, brother (with cane) and probably the scultlptor LhfLeehof. Woman is unidealized, at ease, gazes at viewer without shame or flirtation. Outraged French public.
Manet’s intent – synthesis and critique of history of painting: history paitiinting, portra iture, pastora l scenes, nudes, reliliigious scenes. Main figures in one or two lights or darks – flattens forms, setting them off sharply from setting. Acknowledged painting’s property of flatness. Cue Card
Winslow Homer joined the Union campaign of the Civil War as an artist-reporter for Harper’s Weekly. Veteran in a New Field comments on the effects and aftermath of Civil War and reinforced perception of country’s greatness. Uniform and canteen thrown on ground – cast aside role as soldier. Postwar transition to work and fate of disbanded soldiers were national concerns. Echoing Houdon’s portrayal of Washington as the new Cincinnatus, the New York Weekly Tribune commented: By 1860s cradled scythes were used, Homer “Rome took her man from the painted single-bladed scythe as a symbol of Death plow, and made him a dictator – the Grim Reaper. Painting is also an elegy to – we must now take our soldiers thousands of soldiers who died and might also be from the camp and make them a lamentation on the recent assassination of farmers.” Lincoln. Dr. Samuel Gross, lecturing, while Cue Card performing an operation on a patient Studied painting and medical anatomy at the Pennsyl vani a Acad emy of the Fine Arts The Gross Clinic was rejected from Philadelphia exhibit celebrating American independence centennial of 1876 for its too-brutal realism. Public’s increasing faith that scientific and medical advances could enhance and preserve lives. Takes place in glass-domed amphitheater, with students gathered around taking notes Dominance of empiricism with careful observation and scientific knowledge Patients' mother at extreme left covering her face Gross, patient, and the operation form a triangle Celebrates the advances in medicine Camera to record movement. Rembrandt-like use of light •Expatriate, born in Florence, Italy, younger contemporary of Eakins – looser more dashing Realist portrait style. •Studied in Paris before moving to London – cosmopolitan gentleman. •Velazquez’ Las Meninas may have influenced this painting – children of Sargent’s close friends •Casual positioning, random choice of setting – sense of spontaneity. •Realist – record modern people in modern contexts. Portrayed dignity of working people around him. Cue Card Su bject s i n great d et ail , everythi ng else dissolves in loose stokes of color and light. Expressive lighting reinforces painting’s reverent spirit. After this, Tanner painted Biblical subjects grounded in direct study from nature. At the age of 13, after observing an artist at work at a neighborhood park, TdiddtbTurner decided to become an arti titst. His father, a bishop of the African Methodist Episcopal Church, discouraged his art , hoping he would Influenced by Rembrandt enter the ministry. Portraying an elder teaching a boy how to play the At 21, he enrolled in the Pennsylvania banjo, showed a positive, dignified image of African Academy of Fine Arts where his Americans. teacher, Thomas Eakins encouraged In 1895, believing he could not fulfill his artistic him to paint scenes from everyday life. aspirations in America, Tanner settled in Paris. Realism did not appeal to all artists; the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, organized in 1848 in England - wished to create fresh, sincere art, free from the tired artificial academic manner by the successors of Raphael. Appreciated spirituality and idealism, art and artisanship of the Middle Ages and Early Italian and Northern Renaissance. They relied on literary text for inspiration – both paintings and poetry can be characterized by strong attachment to symbolism Infffluenced by John Ruskin and shared his distaste for materialism and the ugliness of the industrialized world. He believed the job of the artist is to observe the reality of nature and not to invent it in a studio—to render what he has seen and understood imaginatively on canvas, free of any rules of composition. The effect of the critical comments was to make the Pre-Raphaelite movement famous and to create a debate about the relationship between modernity, realism and medievalism in the arts. Cue Card
Millais entered Royal Academy at age 11 Founder of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, whose members refused to be limited to the contemporary scenes of the realists Wished to create fresh and sincere art, free from academic art and influence by Raphael Praised in Paris’ Exposition Universelle, 1855 (Courbet, Pavilion of Realism) Based on Shakespeare’s Hamlet – who kills her father, and she goes mad. PitdPainted bkbackground on sit e in Surrey; EliElibthzabeth Sidda l, his fri end and wif e of Rossetti modeled in a bathtub 19th century architecture most stylistically diverse in history. European history documented in encyclopedias, each nation came to value its past as evidence/validity of ambitions and claims to greatness. When old Houses of Parliament burned in 1834, the neo-classical style, was popular. However, the design was associated with revolution and republicanism while the Gothic style was felt to embody conservative values, the commission announced style be Gothic or Elizabethan. Pugin revered medieval artisans who built great cathedrals with moral purity and spiritual authenticity. Industrial revolution flooding market with ill-designed commodities – return to old craftsmanship. Not genuinely Gothic – formal axial plan and Palladian regularity beneath Neo-Gothic façade. Pugn – “Tudo [English Late Gothic} details on a Cue Card classical body.” Great Britain’s colonial conq,quests, particularly India, had exposed English culture to broad range of non-Western artistic styles. Prince regent, later King George IV asked Nash to design royal pleasure palace in seaside Brighton.
Islamic domes, minarets, and screens – “Indian Gothic.” Cast-iron skeleton underlies exotic façade – early, if hidden use in noncommercial construction. Life-size pal m trees in cast iron support kitc hen ceili ng. Prototype for countless playful architectural exaggerations in European and American resorts. Cue Card Neo-Baroque – grandeur during era of conspicuous wealth during age of expansion. Mirrored opulent lives of privileged. Resembles Baroque domed central-plan churches. Beaux-Arts – style flourished, based on ideas taught at school of same name in Paris. Classical principles (symmetry, interior spaces extend radially from central core. Style was so attractive to moneyed classes that supported arts and theaters that it continued until WWI transformed society. Cue Card Earliest processes were the daguerreotype and the calotype. Daguerre, an architect, theatrical set designer/painter and a partner created – Diorama. Performances of “living paintings” on painted backdrops and translucent front curtains using a camera obscura. Met Niepce,,ppyp who in 1826 made a permanent picture of cityscape outside his window by exposing, in a camera obscura, a metal plate covered with light-sensitive coating. The exposure required 8 hours. After Niepce died in 1833, Daguerre made 2 discoveries: latent dldevelopmen t – br ing ing out image through chemi cal soluti ons, considerably shortened exposure time and “fixing” the image – chemically stopping the action of light on the photographic plate. In 1839, less than 3 weeks after Daguerre unveiled his method in Paris, Talbot presented “photogenic drawings,” calotypes in London. He made “negative” images by placing objects on sensitized paper and exposed – light-colored silhouettes where objects blocked light. Texture ofbl/f paper blurry/grainy image. Nadar improved calotypes, used glass negatives and albumen (prepared with egg white) printing paper. Wet-plate technology – plate was exposed, developed and fixed when wet. Finer detail and gradation than calotypes. Had to be prepared and processed on the spot – portable darkroom (wagon, tent, box with light-tight sleeves). Photography (from Greek photos – light and graphos – writing) suited the a ge of Realism and shift of patronage away from elite to a broader base of support. Comprehensible images and lower costs. Challenged place of traditional modes of painting. Delacroix, Ingres, Courbet, Eakins, and Degas used ppgpyphotography as helpful aid. Others feared it would replace painstaking work of painters. Cue Card Some photographers looked to painting to imbue images with qualities beyond simple reproduction. Each daguerreotype is a unique work; 1st subjects were traditional painting themes – establish artistic medium. 17th century Dutch vanitas still life (like Pieter Claesz), symbolic meanings of objects – sculptural/architectural fragments, framed print of embrace suggest even art is vanitas and will not endure forever. Nadar was a French novelist, journalist, enthusiastic balloonist, and caricaturist. Photographic studies for caricatures led him to open a portrait studio. Captured essence of subject, pose best suited to ppyersonality. Photographed Delacroix, Daumier, Courbet, and Manet. Daumier made print after 1862 court case acknowledging photography as an art form, entitled to copyright protection. Nadar was an advocate of balloon transportation, produced 1st aerial photographs of Paris in 1858 from his balloon. Photographs were objective records of combat deaths. Impresses on people the high price of war. Union soldiers in foreground with boots stolen and pockets piikdcked, indistinct corpses in distance, suggests innumerable other dead soldiers. Years before photolithography could reproduce photographs in newspapers. War photographs were exhibited publicly and made an impression newsprint engravings never could. Cue Card Cue Card
Photoggpyraphy now advanced enoug h that it can capture moments that human eye cannot Cameras snap photos at evenly spaced points along a track, giving the effect of things happening in sequence This bridges the gap between photography and movies
From England, moved to San Francisco; Governor of California – settle a bet if all 4 feet of a horse galloping at top speed are off the ground. Sequential photography – beginning of human and animal motion studies. Culminated in 1885 at University of Pennsylvania – multiple camera motion studies; published Animal Locomotion in 1887. Influenced Eakins, Degas, Duchamp. Presented work with zoopraxiscope project series of images on glass plates onto screen. “Persistence of vision” retains what eye sees for a fraction of a second afterward, merges images – produces illusion of continuous movement.